flee

Lets hope they use the A320Neo for this service - they have 3 (over 16 year old) A320Ceos in their fleet.

They use rather old aircraft (although not as old as the AK B733s) - so they should not launch too many flights as their planes can easily go tech!

Yes, good to have competition - remember how the MH/SQ pot of gold was so zealously protected that AK could hardly get a sniff for so many years!

Well EK has already cut exclusive deals for champagne - https://onemileatatime.com/news/emirates-champagne/ I think this new airline is established to compete with the ME3 - Saudia simply does not play in that league. So it will have to offer something comparable to the existing players.

Yes, with 251t MTOW, they can carry a fair bit of cargo - I think MH's A333s may only have around 230-240t MTOW, so the A339 will give them a lot more flexibility on the KUL-AKL as well as the NE Asia sectors. And it can even fill in for the A359 to LHR, if required.

I think this may be due to the more complex nature of the transaction - see https://www.avolon.aero/newsroom-and-thoughts/avlon-agrees-transaction-for-20-a330neo-aircraft-with-malaysia-aviation-group 10 aircraft have already been ordered by Avolon while the second lot of 10 will be ordered by MAG and a sale and leaseback will be done with Avolon. This order should be for the final lot of aircraft to be delivered - maybe in 3 or 4 years. As such, they can take their time to close the deal. Perhaps we may see some signing at the LIMA or Paris Air Show this year?

Yes, the govt. does not regard MH as that important nowadays - probably because they are not able to turn around after so many years. For MH to progress, it must be completely private with a totally new management philosophy.

I would not want to be flying longer than 4 hours in this config! And that is the max that AK flies, isn't it? I would be interested to see how D7 configures its A321XLR. Hopefully, it will not be as cramped as AK's config.

Yes, I am also a little surprised to hear that the A20N has issues with range. Is it because they are carrying more Teleport cargo these days?

For narrow body, it makes a lot of sense to provide just wifi - the weight saving on not having IFE screens will be significant. Besides, most pax already carry some sort of wifi capable device (phone, laptop, tablet) on board and most frequent travellers also have their airline's apps installed. So dispensing the IFE is not going to be a major issue, provided that airlines have communicated this to pax before the flight. MH's fleet plans are not really transparent - so it can change as we go along!

I believe that MH is trying to upgrade some regional routes to A330s but the lack of aircraft is hindering that move. With new A339s coming next year, we may see some more B738 routes being upgraded and the reconfigured B738s should continue to operate the less popular routes.

My conclusion is that MAHB enjoyed the long slumber and is having a great deal of difficulty waking up. So sad...

MH has many legacy issues - it is a large and inefficient organisation. Perhaps MAG is trying to use FY Jet as a low cost (but not low fare) operation and slowly migrate MH routes to it before closing the MH narrow body ops. It is easier that trying to change MH. If this works, they might even consider doing the same with the widebody ops.

So should MAVCOM conduct an investigation?

The only things that politicians know how to replace frequently are their official cars.

Yes, MH will be letting go of the 737NGs as they will begin to receive their MAXs this year. I am not sure how many FY will end up with, but I guess it will depend on what routes they plan to operate. It would appear that these would be lower yielding ones, judging from the high density LCC configuration of the aircraft.

KLIA seems to be growing at 2m pax per quarter. If it continues, we should reach 15m pax by Q3 or Q4. That would mean we are back to pre pandemic levels. I wonder if that will happen.

Looks like Air Asia and Scoot will be getting some company. I wonder if MH will surrender its slots to FY on this route eventually.

I see that the current Transport Minister has visited KUL and PEN airports. I wonder if he will be able to move anything, given that previous BN Transport Ministers have been enjoying "gaji buta" for a long time! Although not directly related to KLIA, I think the poor management and organisation of the F1 Grand Prix in its final 10 years was an early indication of the decline of KLIA. Nowadays, F1 is enjoying tremendous popularity and if we still had a F1 Malaysian GP, it would have helped in attracting more high spending tourists to the country. The Middle Eastern counties (Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Abu Dhabi) are falling over themselves in bidding to host F1 as they know its commercial value. Unfortunately, the BN govt. of the jailed former PM sucked so much money out of the economy that there is no money left for hosting the F1 GP. Sad!

Unsurprisingly, the service is now suspended: https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/2023/03/02/klias-aerotrain-service-halted-as-precaution/57638 Amongst the airports in this region, we don't often hear about unreliability of airside inter terminal trains at Changi or HKIA. It seems like the poor maintenance culture in Malaysia is something we are so proud of that nothing is done to improve matters.

Well 2035 is not that far away, since we have seen how long it takes for the RMAF to get their assets. This FA-50 order was a result of over a decade of evaluation and consideration! I would say any new MRCA order will first replace the now defunct MiG-29N and subsequently replace the Hornets and Sukhois as deliveries will be in phases/batches. I am doubtful if Malaysia will buy any US fighters again unless they are able to have the unrestricted avionics and weapons capabilities. The US Navy was always sceptical of the performance of single engined fighters for their carriers but they have now got to use them because of budgetary constraints. However, the F-35's engine is not a new one - it is a development of the F-22 engine. As such, reliability issues may not be so bad.

I think the primary concern is budget - remember, they were talking about sale and leaseback arrangements? I think the FA-50 is a reasonable replacement for the Hawk but not the MiG-29N. However, I think that there is no real need to replace the MiGs but the govt. should instead look at a longer term replacement for the Su-30MKM.

Malaysia’s defence ministry to buy 18 FA-50 light attack aircraft from South Korea. https://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/highlight/2023/02/24/korea-aerospace-wins-rm4bil-fighter-aircraft-contract-from-malaysia/

Well I wonder what is happening to those two A339s in DMK? They are still in storage and they seem to be unable to find good routes to take advantage of the A339's capabilities.

I have serious doubts about their financial statements. They have twice changed their financial years. This time, they did not give comparative figures for the corresponding period of the previous year. This serves to mask their true financial position. Also, they continue to receive a lot of complaints about refunds - definitely not a good sign for the future. There are still many planes stored at KUL and DMK. I wonder how many of these will be reactivated or are they getting some more aircraft from elsewhere?